


both a little scared, neither one prepared

by sanzuh



Series: tale as old as time [5]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M, this is an angsty one
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-28
Updated: 2020-10-28
Packaged: 2021-03-09 00:14:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,765
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27085429
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sanzuh/pseuds/sanzuh
Summary: She presses her forehead to her left knee, trying to expel every conscious thought from her mind. Part of her wants to remember and relive what has just happened, wants to let it play out inside her head, so she can cherish it. Jon is making her feel things she's never truly felt before and she's already aching to feel all of them again, but she shouldn't. She should try to forget it, pretend it never happened at all, but when she closes her eyes again, she can almost feel him: his warmth, his strength, his comforting presence.
Relationships: Jon Snow/Sansa Stark
Series: tale as old as time [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1968514
Comments: 33
Kudos: 143





	both a little scared, neither one prepared

Sansa hugs her knees to her chest, curled up into a ball on the bed as tears slip from her closed eyes. Jon has wandered off into the corner where the door out into the armoury is located. She heard him muttering to himself as she was pulling her stockings on.

She presses her forehead to her left knee, trying to expel every conscious thought from her mind. Part of her wants to remember and relive what has just happened, wants to let it play out inside her head, so she can cherish it. Jon is making her feel things she's never truly felt before and she's already aching to feel all of them again, but she shouldn't. She should try to forget it, pretend it never happened at all, but when she closes her eyes again, she can almost feel him: his warmth, his strength, his comforting presence.

 _No,_ she tells herself. _You can't._ Jon came back wrong, she can't blame him for his unnatural desires, but then what is her excuse? Once again, she realizes that before Jon, she had almost forgotten what it felt like to be loved. It's confusing and overwhelming her in such a violent way that it's leaving her dazed and disoriented. And after everything she has been through, she's just become so hungry for love, so desperate for a gentle touch that her mind and body are welcoming his attentions, even though she should know in every fibre of her being that it's wrong. But still, in spite of that knowledge, she wishes she could give him what he wants, that she could make him happy.

"My lady?" It's Satin who's calling out to her. "Why did you let him go outside like that?" There is anger in his voice.

She looks up and Satin freezes and then tosses the pair of dead rabbits he's holding on the table. He approaches her as one would a wounded animal. 

"My lady?" he repeats, but much more softly now, and with a hesitance that makes it sound like a question.

When he is next to the bed, his eyes rest on her position, on her puffy face and her red-rimmed eyes. "Did he hurt you, my lady?" he asks tentatively. 

Sansa shakes her head. "No, he just startled me, is all." She wipes away a tear.

"He's outside, in the snow, completely bare," Satin tells her with a distraught frown on his face. "Would you come with me to get him back inside? He keeps calling out your name."

 _Oh gods!_ She scurries off the bed and pulls on her boots as quickly as she can. As she follows Satin out into the armoury, she hears a howl, not quite like a real wolf's, but close enough.

Just outside the armoury, Jon is on all fours in the freshly fallen snow, face turned up to the moon and still howling. 

She approaches him slowly, and kneels next to him in the snow. "Jon?" she tries gingerly, reaching out to brush his hair back from his brow. His head snaps to her, and there's a wild panic in his wide, dark eyes. He throws his head back again and yelps, the pain in it chilling her to the bone.

"Jon, you're going to catch a chill out here. You need to come back inside."

He lowers his head slowly this time, shaking it vehemently as he meets her gaze with a tortured look in his eyes. "Sansa," he chokes out. "Sansa... say... leave." He's struggling to get the words out, just like he was that very first day.

She frames his face in both of her hands. The snow has already soaked through her borrowed tunic. "Oh, Jon. That's not what I meant. I just needed some space."

He sits up to cover her hands with his own. "Sansa... not... want... me," he whispers roughly. "Jon... wrong."

"I want you to come back inside with me," she answers, to avoid getting into that. She doesn't know how to make him understand. "We're pack, remember? We need to stay together."

He leans into her touch and nods. "Together," he repeats, but he doesn't make any attempt to get up.

"You have to come back inside to keep me safe. It's too cold out here for me," she tells him, turning her right hand in his to lace their fingers together. 

She's not quite sure how she does it, but she manages to get Jon back inside. The short walk through the armoury seems to last hours, but eventually they arrive back in the room they've been sharing. Satin offers her a couple of blankets and she orders him to light a fire.

"My lady," he objects, standing in the middle of the room. "You know I can't do that."

"I'll handle him if it comes to that," she insists, though she's not as certain of herself as she pretends to be. "Do it." She walks over to the table, never releasing Jon's hand, and shows him the pair of rabbits.

"Look what Ghost brought back for you," she tells him in as cheerful a voice as she can muster. His eyes light up and he eagerly reaches for his meal, retreating to a corner to devour it. She follows him to wrap a blanket around his shoulders and cover his legs with another one, but she quickly averts her eyes as his teeth tear into the raw rabbit flesh. The sight still makes her stomach churn.

She turns around to see that Satin has been successful in starting a fire. For now, Jon seems sufficiently distracted by his food not to notice. She approaches Satin, putting some distance between her and Jon, so she can't hear the sounds he's making as clearly.

When Satin rises and turns to look at her, she crosses her arms over her chest, hugging her own frame, and whispers: "Do you think he'll ever be whole again, Satin?"

Satin's eyes travel to the corner behind her and he watches Jon before he answers. "He's better than he was before, since you've come here."

He certainly didn't look better naked and howling out in the snow. He looked worse than she's ever seen him. She knows she was right to end what he was trying to do, but it's clear she was too harsh with him, that he didn't understand her rejection, nor her request to be left alone.

"What happened, earlier?" Satin asks her.

She walks closer to the hearth, holding out her hands to warm them. "He climbed into the tub with me." She keeps her eyes on the flames that are starting to dance, aware that the heat in her cheeks is not the result of the fire. "He wants, he wanted..." _Gods,_ she can't say it. "He doesn't understand," she adds through the lump in her throat.

She's grateful for Satin's silence, for the swift but soft squeeze of his hand on her elbow. She's even more grateful that he doesn't ask any questions, that he appears to understand without any further explanation.

"There was a raven earlier," he tells her, changing the subject. "It carried a letter for you." He hands her the scroll.

"Thank you, Satin. You may take your leave, if you wish. I'm sure you have tasks to attend to."

His eyes flicker to Jon, who's almost finished his pair of rabbits. "Will you be all right, my lady?"

"Yes, thank you," she answers him, waiting for him to leave before she turns to look at Jon again. The tub is still in the middle of the room, full of water that must have cooled down by now, but emptying and removing it will have to wait until the next day. It would probably be unwise to have other people around Jon right now. 

She decides to walk over to him to take his hand and lead him to the bed. He follows her without questioning her.

"I'm tired," she tells him, just to be clear. He lets her tuck him into the bed and wipe the blood off his face, watching her every move as she takes off her boots and cloak before climbing up onto the bed as well. He lies next to her, staring at her with sad, uncertain eyes and his hands folded together under his cheek. 

"I need to read this letter first," she explains to him as she picks up the scroll Satin gave her and opens it. It's from Wylis Manderly, who informs her that Alaric Stone and his men have arrived at White Harbour. Sansa smiles to herself. She'll have to tell Brienne he's reached his destination, and that he's safe. Lord Wylis also assures her that House Manderly will stand behind House Stark as they have for a thousand years.

She doesn't have much of a plan yet, but it's good to know that she won't be alone, that she'll have allies and people to support her. She'll have to wait for a raven from Howland Reed next, which will probably still take a while to arrive. She'll pray that it will though, and that Petyr won't have a chance to thwart her efforts.

She puts the scroll under the pillow and turns to Jon then. What is she going to do with him? He's still staring at her, and it appears as if he hasn't moved a muscle as he waited for her to finish reading her letter. The cold and the snow have barely affected him, but he still seems hurt and unsure after her rejection.

"Come here," she invites him, opening her arms for him.

Slowly and tentatively, he rolls over to rest his cheek on her chest and she wraps an arm around his shoulders, stroking his hair with her other hand. "We're safe," she tells him, not certain what else she might say to make him feel better. "We're together."

"Pack," he mumbles, and she can feel the rumble of his voice in her chest. As she holds him close, she can almost pretend none of it has happened and that they can carry on as they have before, but everything that has happened since he climbed into that bathtub still lingers, heavy and tangible between them, like a thick fog or a gloomy cloud that has descended from the heavens. 

"Sing?" he asks her after a while. 

She inclines her head to kiss the top of his, smiling into his hair. She'll sing a thousand songs if that's what it takes to heal his heart. 


End file.
